Institute_ The
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
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In this bizarre text-based mystery, you assume the role of John, a mental patient who is being held against his will in a hellish asylum known only as "The Institute". Raving lunatics and taunting doctors surround you, and you are continuously harassed by a sinister psychologist who tries to convince you that you have lost your mind. You are unsure of how or why you ended up here, but one thing is clear: you must get out.

Most of the game is spent lying passed out on a closet floor, drifting in and out of drug-induced hallucinations that reveal key aspects of the protagonist's personality and recall traumatic events from his past. Between bouts of nightmarish, self-inflicted "drug therapy", the player uses the knowledge (and sometimes even inventory items) gained from his dreams to learn more about the Institute and to better facilitate his escape.

In typical text adventure fashion, John must navigate the hospital and interact with his surroundings using a very limited two-word parser. There are some basic puzzles to solve, mostly by using objects found throughout your quest, but the game's focus is more on the darkly surreal storyline and disturbing dialogue than its actual gameplay.

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Description from the packaging:

You must escape- and yet the key to that escape exists only in your dreams!
The Institute is an extremely complex adventure, an adventure of the mind. The scenario of the game is a psychological nightmare. Trapped in a mysterious "Institute," you know that you are not mad, and yet many of your fellow inmates are. 

The Freudian solution to your entrapment becomes a series of vivid dreams, introduced by a strange powder. Each of the dreams takes place in a different location, making the adventure actually five adventures in one. Each location contains objects and information that you must use in other places in order to escape. You may actually have to let yourself be killed in order to escape this dream. But will you awaken outside the Institute- or just inside another convoluted dream?
Written in speedy machine language, The Institute represents a new stage in the sophistication of scenarios of computer adventure gaming. Brought to you by Jyym Pearson and ScreenPlay.

Program Parameters:
Language: Machine
Number of Players: 1
Average Completion Time: 8 Hours
Suggested Age Group: 12 and up
Recommended for Novice: No
Classification: Adventure
Special Features: Game-save
Use Joystick or Trackball?: No
Graphics Oriented: Yes
Special Equipment Required: None


http://www.mobygames.com/game/c64/institute
